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As always, you can reach me at [email protected]

Happy Halloween: I promise, big Eagles catch-up in tomorrow’s newsletter. Perfect time for that, especially since the Flyers and Sixers are both off.

But the Eagles had a Halloween party, and I am sorry, we have to talk about Jalen Hurts. I had no idea who Hurts was supposed to be dressed up as, a janitor of some sort clearly. So, I went on Eagles Reddit and found my answer.

Is Hurts supposed to be Mr. Johnson from Abbott Elementary, a show he has been on recently? Does not match up with the costume. Nope, Hurts appears to be, and I am absolutely delighted to report this, Morgan Freeman as God from the fifth-highest grossing movie of 2003, Bruce Almighty. The scene is here on YouTube. The towel is what really gives it away.

This here is right up my alley. My friends are big fans of comedies both good and bad from the 1990s and 2000s. And they are particularly big fans of minor characters from those movies, like the old guy who says “Hell yes!” in the back of the courtroom in Big Daddy. Does this qualify as that level of minor of character? Not quite, Freeman is one of the leads in the movie… but it also is an unbelievably specific costume for Hurts to wear. I love it.

Hurts has listed Friday Night Lights and He Got Game as his favorite movies in the Eagles media guide. But I gotta know what he thinks about Bruce Almighty. Jim Carrey might have the complete opposite personality of Jalen Hurts. Maybe he gets a kick out of Carrey’s comedic stylings for that reason.

Flyers 3, Pittsburgh 2 (SO): Crosby sucks*!

*He scored again, his 10,000th career goal against the Orange Black.

Great rivalry game, overtime, Flyers on a power play and…. WHAAAAAAAA!!!!!!

I know it was the “Frozen Frenzy” and all, but you are cutting to the first 10 seconds of Caps-Stars in the last 10 seconds of Flyers-Pens? They Flyers had a 4-on-3 power play! And when they messed it up, I irrationally blamed the television production choices for the Flyers’ failures. Really though, it’s pretty rational. They weren’t scoring a game-winner on a split-screen.

But you know what they did on a split-screen? Got into an old-school Flyers-Penguins brawl immediately after the overtime!

I think I have written this before, but after the Super Bowls and championship clinchers, I will put Game 3 of Flyers-Penguins in the 2012 playoffs up with any game ever in terms of the most fun I had watching a sporting event. There were a million fights and penalties, so much bad blood, and to top it off, legitimately the worst goaltending you will ever see. The Flyers won 8-4, and it was like an NHL Hitz game. I loved it so much.

Anyway, this was not that. Outside of one softie, Sam Ersson was actually pretty good and continues to dominate in shootouts. But to see what Trevor Zegras did in the clip below, ripping that dude’s helmet off for absolutely no reason when he was on the ice, that was unbelievably good. Pest behavior to the fullest.

Zegras had another assist in this one, as he continues on his point-per-game pace. Travis Konecny scored the 200th goal of his career, that one was pretty cool. And with Zegras unavailable for the shootout due to his pesting, Matvei Michkov and Bobby Brink both scored… with Brink scoring a completely nasty goal.

Nice win for the Orange and Black, the Penguins are off to a good start this season. The Flyers are tied for 12th in points percentage league-wide as well. They have definitely played a ton of home games, but this is a nice start against what looked like a pretty tough opening month of opponents.

Sixers 139, Washington 134 (OT): That’s not true, a lot of people beat The Wiz.

I am not a Calculator Boy like Daryl Morey, but the advanced analytics say that 100 percent of the Sixers games on the young season have been Wild and Crazy Wins (WCWs). They are on pace for (*checks notes*) 82 WCWs. Kyle’s observations are here.

Washington is not gonna be very good this season, but they are playing hard to start things off. They won easily in Dallas last week. And when the Sixers were down 17 early in the fourth quarter, I thought it was understandable enough. A textbook schedule loss, with the Sixers playing a draining game on Monday and then traveling as the Wizards rested up at home. The Sixers looked gassed and Washington was also on fire for most of the game. I got it.

But like we have seen all week, these guys just do not give up. They run through the tape. And they forced overtime with a 32-16 fourth quarter.

For my money, the Sixers’ best player in that fourth quarter was Mr. Qualifying Offer himself, Quentin Grimes. Grimes looked fresher than Tyrese Maxey, and he played great on-ball defense in addition to scoring 12 points in that final frame… including the game-tying 3, a simple flare screen that Nick Nurse drew up out of a timeout.

(If you watch that video, Joel Embiid is going crazy on the bench. Grimes was tweeting up a storm after the game. Vibes are unquestionably good.)

Two more Grimes thoughts:

I know I wrote about this the other day, but I am really getting a kick out of this goofy Sixers center rotation.

It starts out with Joel playing 2.5-ish quarters, whatever his minutes limit is. Joel played 23 minutes last night and had 25 points (9-17 FG), 7 rebounds, 5 assists, +9. Pretty darn good on offense, not very good at all on defense, but hopefully a base that he can work off. And then to close it out, you have no idea what you are going to get. But Nick Nurse has pressed the right buttons so far this season…

It’s goofy, but it’s working!

And just like the building says, Bona 4ever. Bona is an important player, because he has a rim protection skill-set that the other Sixers do not have. Joel is offering very little resistance, which is what it is. Drum is great on the boards, but you cannot rebound when you are taking the ball out your own basket every possession. And he offers almost no rim protection. The small-ball guys are not shot-blockers, either. And the other important thing here: The Sixers’ perimeter defense is also a legitimate catastrophe right now. This team is all-offense, no-defense. The big guys are constantly under siege because the small guys cannot guard anyone either.

(Quick tangent here: There was some serious, “Where does Paul George fit in on this team?” noise yesterday. What, you mean the 6-foot-8 dude who can shoot and play above-average NBA defense? Yeah, I think they will find a spot for him. Look, I am all for making podcast jokes and the like, but c’mon. The Sixers need PG’s skill-set badly.)

But that is where the bouncy Bona comes in, he can block a shot. Frankly, he has more video-game style sequences with two-to-three blocks in a row than anyone I have ever seen. And Bona finished with five blocks in this one, all of which came in the final 12 minutes. He routinely denied C.J. McCollum down the stretch. Good for him, seems like a really good kid.

And yeah, Tyrese Maxey (39 points) rocks. Doug Collins had a great call in overtime of Game 1 of the 2001 NBA Finals that starts out, “Allen Iverson, the courage of this young guy!” That’s what I have thought of watching Maxey the last two nights. Super skilled, but courageous efforts.

Two other quick injury notes:

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No sports tonight! Well, locally that is. There is a little thing called The World Series that keeps on keepin’ on. 2-2 now, Blue Jays are right there.

No Flyers or Sixers pods today, just because both teams will have pre and post-game shows this weekend. But you might want to check out the Eagles pod, as an old friend will stop by and check in.

Your tentative Wednesday schedule at ​PHLY:

Let’s make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
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